Published 4:00 am, Thursday, July 10, 2003

2003-07-10 04:00:00 PDT Modesto -- Scott Peterson's lawyers cannot view the police files in the unsolved slaying of a pregnant San Francisco woman but will have access to her autopsy report and photos, a judge ruled Wednesday.

Judge Al Girolami of Stanislaus County Superior Court said the defense notion that the slaying of Evelyn Hernandez had anything to do with the killing of Laci Peterson was "highly speculative," despite some outward similarities.

Hernandez, a 24-year-old single mother, disappeared in May 2002 with her 5- year-old son, Alex, one week before she was to deliver a baby boy. Part of Hernandez's torso and maternity clothing were found last July 24 in the bay along the Embarcadero near Folsom Street in San Francisco. The boy has never been found, and no arrest has been made.

The bodies of Laci Peterson, 27, and her unborn son washed ashore in Richmond in April. Her husband, 30-year-old Scott Peterson, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder with special circumstances.

His attorneys have suggested that the same person may have killed both women. In May, defense attorney Mark Geragos subpoenaed the entire Hernandez case file, saying it contained information that "directly relates to identifying the actual perpetrators in the abduction and killing of Laci Peterson and her unborn son."

San Francisco police resisted, saying the two cases were not connected and that releasing the Hernandez file could jeopardize the investigation of that killing.

Girolami said Peterson's attorneys cannot have access to search warrants and other San Francisco police documents. But the judge agreed to release the autopsy report and, barring any objections from Hernandez's family, 30 photos from the autopsy conducted by the San Francisco medical examiner's office.

"I'm satisfied there is a considerable public interest in keeping (Hernandez's file) sealed," Girolami said. The investigation "could easily be jeopardized if that material is made public and shared with other people," the judge said.

San Francisco Deputy City Attorney Margaret Baumgartner, who traveled to Modesto with San Francisco homicide inspectors Joe Toomey and Holly Pera, downplayed the release of the Hernandez autopsy, saying it had already been made public in April.

In a separate matter, the judge said 175 newly discovered wiretapped phone calls made to Scott Peterson before his arrest should be released to prosecutors. One call, involving a conversation between Peterson and an attorney, was withheld. The judge also agreed to let reporters listen to their phone calls to Peterson.

Geragos said many of the media calls were "embarrassing."

"I've listened to as many of the media calls as I could stomach," he said, adding if he were among the journalists whose calls had been wiretapped, "I'd be fighting tooth and nail to keep them under protective order."